England applies for associate nation status after heavy loss to New Zealand in World Cup

Wellington. After the heavy defeat at the hands of New Zealand, England skipper Eoin Morgan happily announced that the team has formally applied to the ICC for being considered an associate nation from now on.

An upbeat Morgan told the reporters that getting the ICC nod is just a formality as the team has already demonstrated that they are capable of playing at the same level which ICC expects associate nations to.

“There are many advantages of becoming an associate nation you see. One immediate advantage being, associate nations like my team Ireland, will have a better chance of going through to the knock-out stages than some of the test teams. There are multiple long-term advantages too which include cancellation of Ashes with Australia which will save us a lot of humiliation, and widespread press coverage on defeating a test playing nation and lesser coverage on being defeated.”

On being probed further about how the team expects to cope with the demands of being an associate nation, he said that he was not new to the concept and had already shared his previous experiences of playing for Ireland with the team.

After the interview, when he was sure that no cameras were on him, he whispered “The biggest advantage is that after becoming an associate nation, the cries of bringing back Kevin Pietersen will altogether stop as KP will never consider playing for a non test playing nation.”